As students we have so many tasks on our plate: homework, fighting with the Bursar’s office, attending about five-ten classes in the first week just to decide what we should take. So it is reasonable to be distracted from some of the bigger issues out there.

But recently something struck me as strange; last week, the University had a large sum of money donated through sponsors to make the world’s largest stir-fry — they even had a custom frying pan built. Students attended this, and staff spent time and energy preparing it. When I learned that this was happening it seemed strange to me that people had time to attend this event but not even consider more pressing issues such as the people starving in Somalia.

The United Nations declared a famine this year in Somalia; children are dying daily. All it takes is a simple Internet search to find some of the most horrific pictures of starvation imaginable. The hypocrisy can’t be ignored; we made a 4,000+ pound stir-fry, and there is a whole country of people who haven’t eaten in days.

Then I remembered that this issue is set on such a grand scale. It is hard to contemplate how to address an issue as big as an entire country starving to death. It’s one of those moments when people feel small and helpless.

The U.N. stated that $2.4 billion is needed to deal with the drought; the average work-study job at UMass pays less then ten dollars an hour and most students don’t work full time. So $2.4 billion is a number whose meaning, for most students, is almost impossible to grasp – other then it’s more money than most of us will ever have. Similarly, when we do see a link on the Internet that urges, “click here to donate $5 to Somalia.” it seems useless to follow the link. What is $5 compared to $2.4 billion? Especially when $5 can mean a well-deserved beer or two on Friday night, gas money or a gallon of milk. But these are reasonable reactions. How does our $5 help, and aren’t there more effective ways to offer assistance in the face of a catastrophe?

The most daunting logistical problem that comes to mind is: where do we get $2.4 billion in a short amount of time? To start, who even has that much money? Well, since this has started the news has been reporting billions of dollars being tossed around by certain corporate giants.

First, AT&T has continued its attempt in procuring T-Mobile form Deutsche Telekom at the tune of $39 billion in cash and stocks, with ongoing negotiations for this merger between AT&T and the ever-resistant F.C.C. Let me restate the amount of money being negotiated – $39 billion – for a company. Meanwhile, Somalia needs a measly $2.4 billion to survive. The number doesn’t seem so big when framed in relation to big business.

The number gets even smaller when it is compared to Obama’s $447 billion jobs bill. True, most of this money will be in tax breaks and other kinds of economic policy shifts that don’t require hard currency, but about $140 billion in cold hard cash will be spent over the next few years if the bill is passed. The money will be used to hire teachers, build roads and bridges, and pay for a plethora of other jobs projects.

This $2.4 billion compared to $140 billion seems small. Ask yourself this question: “If I were walking down the road with $100 in my pocket and a starving woman asked me for $2.40 to feed her family for a long time to come, would I say no?”

In the end I don’t think it is wrong to feel overwhelmed by the issue at hand, but we still need to take action rather than hide from it. Consider the numbers, and consider who should be offering their financial support to Somalia.

Michelle Alcott is a Collegian columnist. She can be reached at [email protected].